Now he catches my upper arms, the only touch between us, when he asks, “Do you want me to lick your pussy, Bella?”
I can feel the rush of heat to my cheeks. “Can you just stop talking, please?”
“Please is a good word,” he says. “But not the word I want right now. Say it. Tyler, I want you to lick my pussy."
“No,” I say, appalled, and the minute I say the word and with force, I know it’s a mistake.
“Now you understand how to use that word.” His hands fall away from me, and he steps backward.
My heart thunders in my chest and I grab the lapels of his suit, halting his departure, my naked breasts between us. “No, I don’t want to say it. Yes, I want…” I wet my lips.
He arches a brow. “You want what?”
“Why must I say it?” I plead.
“Why can’t you say it?” he counters, and his hands settle on my hips, his body crowding mine, his powerful legs framing mine as he presses me back against the door.
I know the answer to his question, of course. Those words he wants me to speak feel dirty and awkward, unnatural to me, though I also admit that on some level he’s offering me a naughty escape from the good girl me. But he is also not a stranger, and a stranger who I could play naughty with and then disappear would be empowering. Instead, he is my boss, who I will see tomorrow morning if I even still have a job. Maybe I’m fooling myself into thinking I’m not proving to him I will use sex to get what I want.
Only all I really want is him, and at present, his mouth.
He lowers himself to his knees and leans in and licks my clit. I gasp all over again, sensations twisting and turning inside me. His eyes lift to mine. “Say it, baby,” he says softly and there is the tiniest hint of tenderness in his voice, a reminder that we are more than this moment. “It’s just you and me and it goes nowhere else. Say it and I promise you one hell of an orgasm.”
I can feel myself soften like his words, and ease into the idea of being a bit more daring than I know myself to be, though, in contrast, my fingers curl into my palms. “I want…” I pant out a breath and rush through the entire sentence before I can stop myself, “I want you to lick my pussy.”
His lips curve, his eyes burning with satisfaction, but there is no shame or embarrassment in me to follow. He doesn’t give me time for such unimportant things. He licks my clit, twirling it, and then he’s gently suckling me. And then his mouth comes down over me.
“Oh,” I whisper, giving myself to the sensation of this intimacy, letting my head fall back against the wall.
And then he is licking me in what I can only call a merciless exploration, creating an overload of sensations. The flicking of his thumb on my clit, his tongue sliding left and right, and all over me. His big fingers pressing inside me, stretching me. I can hear the rasp of my heavy breathing, but I have no will to calm any of my reactions to what I feel, what he is making me feel.
My own fingers uncurl from my palm and one hand finds his shoulder, the other his head, but doesn’t stay there long. He lifts my leg, pulling it over his shoulder, and the act presses me onto the door again. The position steals all control from me, locked into position, at the mercy of his tongue and fingers, as they stroke me, driving me wild. Blood roars in my ears and I am lost to all of the wicked things he is doing to me. No, I’m done in by it all. My sex clenches with an intense spasm and from there I tumble into the sweet bliss of release. Remotely, I can hear my own moans and my panting, but I’m beyond holding back anything from Tyler. I quake and quake some more until I collapse into a sated pile of nothing but bones and skin.
I barely register the moment Tyler sets my leg on the ground, nor the moment he stands up. He cups my face and reality zips right back into place. His mouth slants over my mouth, the sweet and yet salty taste of me flavoring my tongue. When I am certain there is more to come, he pulls back and asks, “Can you taste me on your lips, baby?”
I draw a breath because something has shifted in him—his energy and his tone reading darker.
He pulls my bra up and zips my dress before he slides my skirt down. “That’s proof you don’t know how to say no.” He steps away from me and walks behind his desk while I stand there shell-shocked. Was this a game to him? A lesson like I’m a schoolgirl that needs tutoring? “Eight AM for the chat about Dash’s Hollywood deal,” he instructs. “I only have thirty minutes. I have an off-site meeting.” With that, I am dismissed. “Go home.”
Heat burns my cheeks, and I draw a calming breath that is barely calming at all. I decide right then that I could easily tuck my tail and run out of the door. I do the opposite. I march to his desk, stand in front of him and press my hands to the wooden surface. “I chose yes, not no. It was a choice. If I’d wanted to say no, you’d have stayed in your lane. There is a difference between A and B.” I turn on my heel and march toward the door.
“Like there’s a difference between being a bastard and acting like one?” he challenges.
I halt, fingers curling into my palm again. I spin around and face him. “Exactly. And for the record, you are a bastard, Tyler Hawk.”
“Then we achieved something tonight. You finally understand me.”
Indeed, I think, only even in this moment, as angry, hurt, and humiliated as I am, that thought feels flawed. For now, though, I open the door and exit to the hallway. But I do not go home. I will not run. I’m going back to the party just as soon as I make sure I’m not wearing my makeup on my forehead.
Chapter Thirteen
Bella
I enter the bathroom with my thoughts racing. He’s a bastard, but Tyler’s still my boss. I step in front of the mirror and take one look at my swollen lips and catch the edge of the counter. Unless that changes tomorrow, I think.
I shove aside that brutal thought with the same fierceness I all but begged Tyler not to walk away from me. Irritated at my line of thought, I shut down any negativity in my mind. I simply can’t allow myself to go down the wrong rabbit hole, at least not when I’m here at the office. I know me, and if I do that, I will fall apart, even if only momentarily. With a need to be cool and composed, even if it’s a façade of cool and composed, I quickly wipe away the lipstick on my chin, reapply a fresh pink shade, and fix the mess that is my finger fucked blonde hair. I try not to think how close I came to being wholly fucked by Tyler Hawk because I might as well have been. I had my leg on the man’s shoulder and his mouth all over me. Okay, I’m going to freak myself out. It’s time to leave.
I head for the door only to realize my nipple is not in my bra. Of course, it’s not. I right the wrong, at least this one. There’s no saving me from most of what I’ve allowed to happen, or as Tyler put it himself, the consequences, whatever they may be, of what I allowed to happen. Drawing a deep, calming breath, I pray Tyler is still in his office, and exit the bathroom. The coast appears clear, but I hurry to the elevator and punch the button over and over, glancing at the corporate office door several times as I do. As if either of those things will assure Tyler doesn’t exit from the lobby before the elevator opens.
Finally, the car dings, the doors open, and I enter the elevator. I punch the rooftop button and hold my breath as I’m slowly sealed inside as if I’m in a horror movie and the monster might catch me. I’m fairly certain though I’m my own monster in this case because as Tyler said, I didn’t say a proper no. I didn’t say no at all. Once I’m secure and alone, I lean on the wall and let out a breath of relief, only to inhale the distinctly masculine scent of Tyler’s cologne. He was just in the elevator, which means he either left the building or he’s upstairs, where I’m headed. Lord, help me, but I’m not going to hide from this. I will see him again. I will face him again. I will hate him again. I will work with him again.